


Black Thumb / Green Wallet

by tisfan



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gardens & Gardening, I pick things up and put them down, M/M, Meet-Cute, Tony is not afraid of hard work, gardener au, green thumb
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:28:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25019287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tisfan/pseuds/tisfan
Summary: Tony doesn’t know anything about plants.Bucky-- has no idea who this crazy guy is, but he has a cute butt and is willing to help out. Guess gardening 101 is in sessionFor StarkBucks Bingo O3 - "Why do I even bother?"
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Tony Stark
Comments: 55
Kudos: 455
Collections: StarkBucksBingo2020





	Black Thumb / Green Wallet

**Author's Note:**

  * For [monobuu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/monobuu/gifts).



“Why do I even bother,” Tony said, looking disgusted. The plants, which had been bright and cheerful a few days before were limp, drooping, and one of them had turned black. He wasn’t sure which one was more pathetic, the dead one or the one where all the leaves had fallen off.

It wouldn’t be so bad, really, except that Pepper had given him the plants, specifically for his birthday. And she and her husband Happy were coming to visit for the fourth of July weekend. Tony’s balcony had a good view of the fireworks and they could drink and eat without being surrounded by people. 

It had been a while since Tony had seen her in person, really. The plants had been part of some delivery system, and Tony had watered them and put them in the windowsill.

He thought he’d even managed to water them more than once.

Probably. He thought.

Pepper wouldn’t say anything if she didn’t see the plants. She wouldn’t. She wasn’t that kind of person. But she would look around for them, and then for just a second, her eyebrows would get that little wrinkle and Tony would know she was disappointed in him, once again.

There were so many people who were disappointed in Tony on such a regular basis, it was hard to admit to disappointing Pepper.

“Fine,” he exploded at the empty air. “Fine.” He gathered up the little stakes from the plants that told him what they all were. There had to be someone at the nursery -- he was pretty sure that garden shops were called nurseries. Maybe they were called nunneries. Now he couldn’t remember, damnit. -- that knew enough to get him at least replacement plants and he could pretend everything was fine.

Like when he was eight and his mom forgot to tell the maids to feed the goldfish while they were on vacation, and she had them replaced with new fish. Like he wouldn’t notice.

Well, Pepper at least hadn’t seen the plants. 

Had she? He thumbed through his texts and emails to her to see if he’d mailed any photographs. And no, he hadn’t. Except for one, but maybe he could tell her he’d had to repot that plant.

Probably.

Right?

Jesus, he was in trouble.

* * *

“Hey, hey, excuse me,” someone said. Bucky, who was staring into the endless depths of the delivery truck and knowing for a fact that Quill was slacking somewhere in the back with his headphones in, sighed. He was the only employee out in the nursery, which was usually fine, but then someone had to go and want to know why the begonias weren’t on sale. 

_Lady, I don’t make policy around here._

_Can you carry this to my car? No._

_Would you-- No._

Bucky didn’t bother to answer. He laid another flat of pansies on the handtruck and started wheeling it down the truck’s ramp. If he didn’t get the plants unloaded by the time the driver got back, the driver would leave, half the flowers undelivered, and then there’d be hell to pay.

“Hi, yes,” the guy said as Bucky rolled the flat down the ramp. “So, I looked around and there’s no one else here, and I hate to bother you--”

Bucky gave the guy his thousand yard stare, but it didn’t seem to have any effect. Right. “How can I help you, sir?”

“So, like, I don’t know anything about plants--” 

Oh, Christ.

“Neither do I,” Bucky lied. He was, in fact, a master gardener, and he’d convinced the owner of Hydra Hardware to add on the nursery, but it also meant he was extremely overworked. “I just pick up heavy things and put them down. I gotta unload this truck, man.”

“If I help you unload, will you answer some questions?”

What?

Bucky looked the guy over; he was wearing painted on jeans and a ratty band t-shirt that showed off biceps for days. Did a very slow pan and scan, and even added in a little twirl of his finger. He wasn’t quite sure if he was trying to embarrass the guy, or what, but holy crow, the rear view was really, really nice.

“Don’t suppose you have better shoes than that out in your car,” Bucky said,

“Huh?”

“You’re wearing keds. If you drop something on your foot, you’ll break a toe, and I don’t want to get sued for that.”

“Wha-- oh, you know, I have steel-toed boots in the trunk, if I get them, and help you, will you answer some questions about plants?”

“Sure, why not.”

Because Bucky was almost positive that the guy did not have work boots in his car, probably some doc martin knock offs, which were great for working a shift behind the counter at the coffee shop, but still weren’t up for dropping a flat on your foot.

“Great, you’ve saved my life, sunshine,” the guy said, and dashed off. He actually ran pretty fast, Bucky noted. 

Well, stranger things had happened, but Bucky couldn’t remember when. He shook his head and got back to work. He’d almost forgotten about the guy when he came back, wearing black boots and a baseball hat. “Huh, are those _mining_ boots?” 

“Matterhorns,” the man said. “I do a lot of workshop stuff-- rebuilding engines and stuff. Got tired of replacing my boots every three months.”

“Huh, okay, then. I gotta get all these flats off the truck in the next thirty minutes. You know how to operate a hand truck, or you just want to load, an’ I’ll take them down the ramp?”

“I got this,” the man said, and he pulled out a pair of work gloves, and got down to it. Nice. Bucky’d probably get fired if Pierce came out and saw him putting a customer to work, but Pierce didn’t come out of the back office all that often. “My name’s Tony, by the way.”

“Bucky--” Bucky displayed his employee name tag. “Nice to meet you.”

The guy was strong, shifting the plants as if he did more to get those muscles than go to the gym. Gym rats couldn’t pick up shit, they knew how to lift a weight bar, but not how to pick up one side of a washing machine without throwing their back out.

“So, what’s your boggle?” Bucky asked after most of the flats were unloaded. “Bring those with you, I gotta rack ‘em.”

“So, one of my friends got me some plants to liven up my condo,” Tony said. “And-- I’m not so good with plants, and they all died.”

“Happens,” Bucky said, philosophically. “What plants?”

Tony handed him a bunch of plant stake labels. 

“Uh-huh,” Bucky said. “And what did you do with them?”

“Put them in the windowsill and watered them every few days,” Tony said, crossing his heart like Bucky wouldn’t believe him.

“Okay, well, first off, some of these need more light than that, and some need less, and this one doesn’t need to be watered all that often.”

“So, you can help me?”

“Depends,” Bucky said. “If you want replacements so your lady friend won’t sneer at you and you might get laid--”

“Pepper is a friend’s _wife_ ,” Tony said, grumpily. “And I don’t date women anyway. I’m a failure as one of those sitcom type gays, though. I don’t keep my house clean, I’m only a snazzy dresser if I have someone else picking out my wardrobe, and I don’t know the first thing about interior decorating. _Queer Eye_ would completely disown me.”

“No, _Queer Eye_ would help you,” Bucky said, grinning. “But I guess we can go with Queer Eye for the Plant Guy. Look, you tell me what kind of lifestyle you’ve got and what you want your plants to do-- not what Pepper thinks you should have, and I’ll help you get all set up, and teach you how to take care of them. I can give you some good website resources, too.”

“Yeah?”

“Sure can,” Bucky said. He waved at the truck driver as Kurt packed up and pulled out. “Look, it’s my break now, come on, we can talk while I eat.”

“Buy you a cup of coffee and a danish?” Tony jerked a thumb at the bakery across the street. “And you can teach me all your planty secrets?”

“Sounds good to me,” Bucky said.


End file.
